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A review by slibourel
Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi
5.0
In the mid-1700s, in what is now known as Ghana, an Asante woman (from the interior of Ghana) is stolen from her village in a raid to feed the slave trade on the Gold Coast. She is instead selected to work as a housegirl in a Fante (from the coast of Ghana) village, where she is impregnated by her captor. After giving birth to a daughter, the woman sets a devastating wildfire and escapes back to a village in the Asante region. Her daughter, Effia, is left behind to be brought up by her father and one of his wives. After her escape, the woman is married to a powerful Asante leader and gives birth to a second daughter, Esi. Homegoing is the story of the descendants of both of these girls, who never have the opportunity to meet: Effia, who is married off to white slave trader who lives in one of the large forts (Cape Coast Castle) that functions as a port for embarkation of slaves onto ships bound for America and other destinations; and Esi, who is captured and sold into slavery in America.
The story is told over the course of the next 250 years, in successive generations of both girls, alternating between the descendants of Esi in America and Effia in Ghana. Both families suffer from the taint of slavery. Effia's family in Ghana lives through the slave raids by the Fante and Asanti people, wars for independence from Great Britain, drought, and famine. Esi's family in America lives through slavery, escape via the Underground Railway, penal enslavement in coal mines in the South, the Great Migration, and the scourge of heroin in 1980s Harlem.
I can't say enough accolades for Yaa Gyasi. This is a first novel, and a monumental undertaking, but Ms. Gyasi manages to provide enough development of the characters in the generations to understand the history of African-Americans and Ghanaian people, and how their lives are exploited by white people. The book presents a brutal but accurate picture. In the end, the descendants of the two half-sisters emerge (mostly) whole and (mostly) free.
The story is told over the course of the next 250 years, in successive generations of both girls, alternating between the descendants of Esi in America and Effia in Ghana. Both families suffer from the taint of slavery. Effia's family in Ghana lives through the slave raids by the Fante and Asanti people, wars for independence from Great Britain, drought, and famine. Esi's family in America lives through slavery, escape via the Underground Railway, penal enslavement in coal mines in the South, the Great Migration, and the scourge of heroin in 1980s Harlem.
I can't say enough accolades for Yaa Gyasi. This is a first novel, and a monumental undertaking, but Ms. Gyasi manages to provide enough development of the characters in the generations to understand the history of African-Americans and Ghanaian people, and how their lives are exploited by white people. The book presents a brutal but accurate picture. In the end, the descendants of the two half-sisters emerge (mostly) whole and (mostly) free.